Dismantling Weapons Poses Logistics, Security Challenges

WASHINGTON—The prospect of Syria surrendering its chemical weapons has fueled hopes the U.S. will avert its fourth conflict in a decade, but U.S. officials face a daunting array of political, diplomatic and security obstacles.

ENLARGE

This photo by an opposition group shows chemical testing by a U.N. inspector.
Associated Press

Carrying out Russia's plan to dismantle Syria's stockpiles of mustard gas and sarin and VX nerve agents is viewed as a long shot by many diplomats, top experts and current and former U.S. officials.

"The Russian proposal sounds attractive, but very quickly, operational problems could derail obtaining international control, much less actually destroying the arsenal," said Amy Smithson, an expert on chemical weapons at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies in Washington, D.C.

Few American or European diplomats are confident Syrian President Bashar al-Assad will fully declare the extent of his government's weapons stockpile, given Damascus's track record of deceiving the international community.

The United Nations' nuclear watchdog is still seeking Syria's cooperation in verifying evidence it was covertly developing nuclear weapons before Israeli jets destroyed a plutonium-producing reactor on the Euphrates River in 2007. Mr. Assad has repeatedly denied having such a secret program.

Syria's chemical-weapons arsenal has been developed and stored in at least eight sites across the Arab country. Many of the missiles and artillery pieces are believed to have been moved since civil war broke out in 2011, according to current and former U.S. officials.

Moscow, Washington and the U.N.'s inspectors are seen as severely limited in Syria's chaotic environment in their ability to locate and secure these weapons, according to these U.S. officials.

A U.S. official cast doubt about how any deal to strip Mr. Assad of his weapons could be verified. "That is a problem," the official said. "How verifiable does it need to be? Getting 50% or 60% of the chemical weapons is not good enough. We would have to get 90% to 95%."

U.S. officials said they have "persistent" reconnaissance of the chemical weapons sites in Syria.

While officials wouldn't discuss their estimates of how much of the stockpile they have under observation, officials said they have confidence they are tracking the vast majority of the chemical weapons.

The Obama administration believes any international inspectors sent to Syria would require outside protection in order to do their work safely, said U.S. officials.

That could require both a durable cease-fire and an international force, current and former officials said. Any inspectors would likely come from the U.N.'s Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.

Chemicals in War: Troy to Today

U.S. findings that Syria used chemical weapons against civilians and rebels are the latest evidence of a long history of the use of chemical and biological weapons in warfare—dating back to the Trojan War. Getty Images

But few countries are expected to volunteer because of the security risks. And Syrian rebels say they won't respect a cease-fire to help the inspections process.

Russia is well-positioned to locate Syria's chemical weapons inventory, due to the central role Moscow has played in developing Damascus's military since the end of the Cold War, said proliferation experts who have studied Syria's program.

President Obama agreed to explore a Russian-backed proposal that would have Syria hand over its chemical weapons, while senators are working on alternative legislation regarding U.S. intervention. Justin Vogt, senior editor at Foreign Affairs, joins the News Hub to discuss.

Damascus began building its arsenal in the 1970s under Mr. Assad's father, Hafez al-Assad, and gained support from the Soviet Union and some of its communist allies, including the former state of Czechoslovakia.

Syria also gained support from North Korea and Iran in recent decades in developing both the precursor chemicals used in creating mustard gas and sarin, as well as the missiles to deliver them, according to proliferation experts.

Around 100,000 people have died in Syria's civil war. What is it about chemical weapons that has the Obama administration considering military intervention now? WSJ's Jason Bellini has #TheShortAnswer. File Image: Associated Press

Current and former U.S. officials say the best prospect for success is if Russian President Vladimir Putin personally puts his reputation on the line in order to secure Syrian cooperation. Mr. Assad is seen as dependent on the Kremlin for the energy, financing and weapons needed to fight off Syria's rebel armies.

"No nation has as much long-term knowledge about the production and concealment of chemical weapons as does Russia," said Paula DeSutter, who helped oversee the dismantling of Libya's chemical-weapons program as part of the George W. Bush administration. "If Russian credibility is made to stand or fall on rapidly and totally securing and eliminating Syria's chemical-agent production…a positive result is more likely."

Russia says it is committed to dismantling Syria's chemical-weapons program.

Senior U.S. officials said Secretary of State John Kerry has been studying the Bush administration's largely successful efforts to disarm the late Libyan dictator Col. Moammar Gadhafi starting in 2003 as a potential template for Syria.

The U.S. cooperated closely with the U.K. at the time to secure and remove most of Libya's infrastructure for developing nuclear weapons and destroyed its delivery systems for chemical agents. Mr. Kerry and his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, have talked of overseeing a similar process in Syria, said U.S. officials.

Still, Ms. DeSutter and other proliferation experts said there are significant differences between Syria and Libya's weapons programs.

Mr. Assad's arsenal is significantly larger than Col. Gadhafi's was. And many experts don't believe the Syrian leader intends to give up his weapons, in part, because his government is still at war.

"The Libyans basically decided to show us everything," said Ms. DeSutter. "I can't believe this will be the case with the Syrians."

A more likely analogy for Syria is Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Iraq, following the first Gulf War in 1991, engaged in years of cat-and-mouse games with U.N. inspectors seeking to learn the extent of Baghdad's nuclear and chemical-weapons programs.

The U.N. ultimately succeeded in destroying most of Iraq's chemical weapons. And Mr. Hussein didn't possess the nuclear program the Bush administration said existed before the second Gulf War in 2003. But the uncertainty surrounding Iraq's weapons programs was fed by the Iraqi government's unwillingness to cooperate with the U.N.

U.S. officials said they have already seen signs that Syria will try to undermine U.N. inspectors.

Inspectors who arrived in Damascus last month to investigate claims Mr. Assad gassed civilians were blocked from quickly going to visit hospitals, say U.S. officials.

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